Founded in 2009, Lapis invests in special situations with an emphasis on turnaround opportunities in the municipal bond market. Founder and Managing Principal of Lapis Advisers, Kjerstin invests primarily in distressed/misunderstood revenue municipal bonds and, secondarily, through the origination of loans to public and private issuers within the broad U.S. municipal marketplace. Their capital base provides the flexibility to custom-tailor solutions for borrowers that may not be easily served by more traditional credit providers. 

Municipalities have been one of the areas most impacted in this crisis because of a decline in tax revenues. As a stressed and distressed credit manager navigating the world mid-crisis, Kjerstin was actively calling capital to put to work in March and early April, and we wanted to hear her insights on the opportunities that she was finding in the time of market panic—as most others were selling! 

FountainCap, located in Hong Kong, was founded in July 2014 by Frank Ding. As one of the most senior Chinese fund managers, with more than 26 years of investment experience at three leading asset management firms in the U.S. and Asia, Frank is on the ground in China and has been investing in Asia equities since 1994. During his investment career he has been through seven major market cycles and achieved superior long-term results. FountainCap Global China Opportunity Fund is a long-only public equity strategy focused on China in a global context. 

With China two months ahead of the U.S. in the COVID-19 outbreak, lockdowns, and subsequent recovery, we had Frank join us from Hong Kong to talk about the impact on China’s economy, financial markets, and consumer behaviors—giving us a glimpse into the future. As the timing worked out, Frank joined us the same week that Wuhan lifted their 76-day lockdown.

As Founding Partner of Lead Edge Capital, a NYC and Santa Barbara-based private/public growth equity firm that has deployed over $1.8 billion across four top-quartile performing funds, Mitchell’s internet and SaaS heavy portfolio has done exceptionally well in good times and is even excelling in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. Lead Edge’s first “multi-bagger” was an early stake in Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba, and they have continued the pace with pre-IPO investments in Spotify, Uber, Duo Security, Delivery Hero, among others. 

Mitchell Green provided the growth equity investment point of view and spoke to why now is an important time to invest in high growth technology companies—with this pandemic accelerating the shift to the new economy. 

As Founder of Valiant Capital, a San Francisco-based $2 billion global long/short equity hedge fund, Chris has deep expertise on the short side, and a significant ability to navigate volatile markets and profitable hedge fund strategies in a downturn. Valiant has significant exposure to new economy companies such as Zillow, Uber and Instacart. In a WSJ News Exclusive on April 2, 2020, Chris is featured for how he was getting worried about coronavirus in January. “This Hedge Fund Saw Risks of Coronavirus Early. Now It’s Up 36%. Chris Hansen’s Valiant boosted hedges and bet against companies it viewed as more likely to be hurt by an economic slowdown.” 

Chris Hansen honed in early on the risks the COVID-19 virus posed and placed wagers accordingly back in January and February, with Valiant putting up some of the best returns in the hedge fund industry amidst the first quarter tumult. As a hedge fund investor known for short selling, we had Chris join us to provide the skeptic, pessimist point of view.

Wall Street’s long reigning number one economist for an unprecedented 39 years in Institutional Investor’s annual survey, Ed is a Wall Street legend. ISI has Institutional Investor’s number one research teams in five macro areas: portfolio strategy, Washington research, technical analysis, economics, and integrated oil. ISI’s broker dealer clients are institutional investors in the U.S. and abroad. Ed and his team at ISI are close friends of Crestone Capital, and access to Evercore ISI has been one of Crestone’s secret weapons for decades to help inform our investment decisions.

As a long time friend of Crestone, we asked Ed to join our call to share his expert point of view on the economic impact of lockdowns and COVID-19 spread, during the week that President Trump and the White House finally rolled over on their stance on the virus. Ed surmised on what happens to GDP growth, S&P earnings, unemployment claims, oil markets, policy response, fiscal stimulus and more.

Biotech’s preeminent venture capitalists and Forbes Midas List: Top Tech Investors 2020, Bob cofounded more than 25 companies that have reached billion-dollar valuations in his career including cancer immunotherapy treatment maker Juno Therapeutics, acquired for $9 billion in 2018. The ARCH Venture Partners co-founder helped start Vir Biotechnology in 2016; the company has since become a leader in fighting infectious diseases, including COVID-19. 

As one of biotech’s most successful venture capitalists, a vocal Twitter presence, and a well-connected industry insider with early insights into COVID-19, we asked Bob Nelson to speak about the U.S. government’s reaction to COVID-19 and share his thoughts on what this all meant for public health implications.

As Managing Partner of Section 32, a technology and life sciences-based venture capital fund, with companies at the forefront of clinical diagnostics and genomics, and a physician with more than 20 years of experience, Mike brings a breadth of understanding in personalized medicine and venture capitalism. Mike served as Board Chairman, Chief Executive Officer and President at Foundation Medicine, Inc., a molecular information company, which was acquired by F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd. in 2018. Previously, Mike was the former President and COO of Clarient (GEHC) which was acquired by GE Healthcare in 2010.

Mike has recently been putting his 20 years of experience in healthcare and diagnostics to work in helping leaders in the industry, and policymakers, think about how to better meet the urgent need for national testing in the COVID-19 pandemic. He shared his expert insights on the disease early in the U.S. outbreak, right before COVID-19 was declared a global pandemic.